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Fixing That Old Game System
larsoncc writes "Emulation is a great way to preserve past game systems, but what if you could keep these digital dinosaurs running for decades? Well, you can, and some of us do. It's not easy for me to 'let go' of that vintage (circa 1978) Magnavox Odyssey2, or toss my Atari 7800 in the closet because I don't have a power supply. Here's my article to help you solve common problems with 15 different systems, and general tips for the others. Viva la TI-99/4a!!"
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Big Dig-ing until the money is gone...
Here's the coral cache link, and here's a list of the systems included in the article:
Odyssey^2
Atari 2600
Intellivision
Atari 7800
TI-99/4a
NES
Genesis
Sega CD
Turbo Grafx
Saturn
Dreamcast
PS2
XBox
GameCube
GameBoy Advance
Anyway, the weak link in th C-64 was not the computer itself, but the power supply, which was separated. Since it was somewhat complicated (fully regulated) and encased in a solid black epoxy box, most people didn't bothered to fiddle with it. This site has the complete schematic for a power supply, from where you can either fix it or build a new one entirely.
Older gaming systems had very little power, so programmers would code the games in low-level machine language, and they would use many different hacks, tricks, and some games even time things based on counting CPU cycles and precise timing delays between different hardware subsystems. So it shouldn't be a surprise that games developed for these consoles play best on the original console.
The SNES is probably the best example of this because it was probably the most complicated and powerful game console, which was still programmed using low-level machine language. The aforementioned link describes inaccuracies in the best SNES emulator, ZSNES. Further comlicating matters is that some SNES games have separate co-processors built into the cartridge, and so the emulators must also emulate these separate processors, which have their own instruction set, protocol, timing delays, and communication bus. Since SNES games were written in assembler, developed soley for one fixed hardware platform, and then only tested on that system... it shouldn't be a surprise that the games play best on a real SNES.
Yet most gamers have never actually compared a real SNES to emulation. Some games are emulated better than others, but some are just downright bad. Of course, emulation is always improving, and in the distant future, when the real SNES's are all dust, emulation will be the only option. Hopefully it is perfected by then.
Of course, you can cheat and use a Flash Cart or Game Copier
(2), (3), with a real SNES, so that you get the best of both worlds: tons of SNES games on a real SNES with real SNES controllers all hooked up to a TV in front of a comy sofa!
Despite the promises or anything you have heard, never, EVER use Armor All on a plastic or vinyl surface that is not already dried/perished/damaged. Armor All is very good at removing the native polymers in the plastic and replacing them with itself. Once it has made it into the surface, you will continually need to replenish the Armor All or risk losing the plastic. I have seen this product ruin more dashboards, tires, motorcycle seats, trim rubber and so on than I would care to recall.
If you want an Armor All type finish on your plastics, use a hand glaze or plastic dressing. These products are available from auto stores, and auto paint suppliers. Slightly off-topic: if you want your old car/cycle tires to look like new, use a little brake fluid on a rag.. works miracles.
There's a Starman, waiting in the sky / He'd like to come and meet us, but he hasn't got the time.
PIXEL PERFECT??!?! Hahahahaha! There are lots of holes in your arguments, man. Here is a tip, Star Ocean does not look like that pixelated buggy mess on a real SNES.
Well, the SNES emulators such as ZSNES and SNES9x don't emulate things correct down to the last pixel. Here is a good article describing many of the inaccuracies of SNES emulators. Hell, the co-processor used in many SNES games, such as Pilot Wings and Super Mario Kart still doesn't have all of its opcodes emulated!
Also, can you tell me what happens when you have a game that displays at native digital resolution X with refresh rate Y, but your computer is not capable of displaying resolution X and your CRT can't do refresh rate Y? You have to scale up the game's resolution, but that causes aspect ratio problems as computer CRT's have a slightly different aspect ratio than NTSC TVs. So you get both aspect ratio distortion and aliasing, unless the resolution your computer displays is a perfect multiple of your console's resolution, which is highly unlikely. To correct for aliasing due to scaling, emulators typically blur the image to get rid of the jaggies. Compare an emulated SNES game side by side with a real SNES. Big difference! Oh, and back to the refresh rate differences. Games sync to the refresh rate of a TV, a rate that your CRT cannot do as it is a really low refresh rate. So if you spend allot of time you can get your OS to use a really high refresh rate that most CRTs do not support, but is a perfect multiple of the native SNES refresh rate...
Should we even get into the fact that the OS your emulator is running on is not a real-time OS, and most likely has latency spikes, causing the occassional stutter, hicup, etc? Early consoles such as the SNES have no underlying OS, so the timing of each instruction is always the same, always precise... and some games actually depend on the percise timing because they are all written in machine language... unlike later game systems such as the Playstation, for which games were programmed in higher-level languages such as C and displayed graphics and played sounds using high-level APIs. Hence for these later systems, precise pixel perfect timing issues are not as important.
My point is that this is all very very far from pixel perfect. But I guess you have never really compared both side-by-side.
On the topic of console controller adapters. Most of the console adapters suck. They don't support other peripherials like light guns, spinners, and paddles. There are some exceptions. The Atari 2600 has a great controller adapter that supports every 2600 peripherial and the N64 Adaptoid is another good adapter. However, many of the PSX adapters have serious lag issues... some worse than others.
The SNES is a really big offender. Almost all of its USB adapters just plain suck. The "Super Joy" USB adapter won't let you press the X and B buttons at the same time, and the same goes for the Y and A buttons. That is a serious problem for some games. Not to mention that the SNES adapters also have latency issues.
On your last point, yes emulators are the long term future of classic games, but if we all throw away the real thing too early, we will end up with subpar emulation that isn't as good as the real thing. Some gaming systems, such as the NES have highly accurate emulators such as FCE Ultra and Nestopia... but other systems such as the SNES have a long way to go before I put my SNES in storage.
Well, while blowing on a cartridge may seem to make it work, it's actually doing it more damage and will end up corroding the contacts. If you need to clean your games, try using a baby wipe - keeps my Mega Drive and SNES carts in fine order.
If you're still having problems with the NES, try either repairing or replacing the cartridge connection within the console. As you insert and remove games, the contacts slowly get bent out of position, until they eventally fail to touch the games when inserted. You can either bend the contacts carefully back into place, or buy a cheap (under £2, so I believe) replacement. Either way, enjoy your NES! (I was always a Master System player myself...)
And tomorrow the stock exchange will be the human race
One key universal fixit that I didn't see mentioned is to reseat the socketed chips. I've fixed so many old systems by applying a little force to socketed chips until they "crunch".
A few other tips:
Always unplug power supplies when they're not in use. It says this in the old manuals, and my experience is that it dramatically increases the life of the supply.
Also, since I deal the most with the Atari 2600, a common problem is that the switches start getting sketchy. This is usually that the solder joints have cracked (which can be fixed by just re-heating them with a soldering iron) or just that the switches need a little contact cleaner sprayed in them. And the paddle controllers almost always need their pots sprayed with contact/tuner cleaner.
It's amazing how well those old systems hold up if you take good care of them.
-paul
I only read the first paragraph and already disagree..
Battery corrosion can and must be cleaned up.
Yes you need an acid. But this does not sound as bad as it looks.
Vinager wil do the job.. I neutralised some battery-corroded cpu boards of 25 year old pinball machines this way.. www.marvin3m.com/fix.htm explains how to deal with battery corrosion.
Leaving the problem like the author suggests is the worst thing you can do ! Because battery corrosion just keeps on burning and traveling over pcb's and if you wait long enough, nothing will survive anymore. It can even travel through connectors and wires and attack other pcb's which are connected to it.
I recently fixed a pinball cpu with battery corrosion.. bought the game cheap, 'it always worked and stopped working one day'
the cpu looked ok, no obvious signs (green color) of leakage, battery had even be removed in the past..
however 2 ic sockets didn't make any contact at all anymore.
So my guess is that the battery had leaked and it had been cleaned off but not really neutralised, and the stuff that got under the ic's kept burning away..
Learn about pinball machines on www.flippers.be